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Thursday, February 26, 2009

Vegan Middle Eastern Bean Salad with Parsley and Lemon (Balela)

This Vegan Middle Eastern Bean Salad with Parsley and Lemon makes a great lunch or side-dish salad any time of year.

When I spotted this middle eastern bean salad called Balela on MeleCotte, I immediately saved it into my del.icio.us bookmarks under a recipe to try. That category always has lots of recipes saved, and I actually only manage to try a small percentage of them, but this time I had all the ingredients and made the salad right away. Simple recipes like this where you can use canned beans and still get a good result are my idea of convenience food, and this recipe was definitely a winner.

Pour chickpeas and black beans one at a time into a colander placed in the sink, rinse well until no more foam appears, and let drain. (I often blot them dry with a paper towel if I get impatient and they still seem wet.)

While beans are draining, whisk together lemon juice, olive oil, and garlic puree and let the flavors blend.

Mix the salad ingredients together and let it marinate at room temperature for at least 30 minutes. (If I had more time I might marinate the beans for a few hours in the dressing, then mix in the other ingredients for the last 30 minutes.)

One at a time, empty canned beans into a colander placed in the sink, rinse well with cold water until no more foam appears, then let beans drain well. (I sometimes blot them dry with a paper towel if they still seem wet.) Put well-drained beans into a plastic bowl.

While beans drain, chop green onions, tomatoes, and parsley and add to bowl. Whisk together dressing ingredients. Gently mix dressing into bean mixture, stirring just enough to combine and coat the ingredients with dressing. Let salad sit at room temperature for at least 30 minutes before servings, then season with more salt and fresh ground black pepper to taste.

(If I had lots of time I would drain beans, mix dressing, and then stir in about half the dressing into beans and let them marinate for a few hours before I added the other ingredients.)

Despite the fact that tomatoes shouldn't be refrigerated, this was actually very tasty even after being in the fridge for a few days. If you know you won't eat it all right away, you could mix together everything but tomatoes and add them each time you eat some.

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So glad people can imagine how good this tastes from the recipe and photo. I just got my bottom braces on tonight, but I'm thinking bean salad like this would work, fairly soft and already cut into small pieces.

KalynYou are certainly a trooper -- "got my bottom braces on today". Wow, good luck. But you have so many wonderful soup ideas on this blog that you should be ok for months. I still have some organic dried pintos in the house and will make this salad next week. Thanks for a great idea on how to use them.

This salad is so refreshing and delicious! Instead of green onion I used a shallot. I also added a yellow bell pepper for some color. I halved some grape tomatoes and added them to the salad after the salad had set in the refrigerator all night. I also squeezed some extra lemon juice over it for more tang. I love this salad! Could you also sprinkle feta over it? I'm sure its also wonderful it you put it in a butter lettuce leaf and eat it like a wrap. Anyway, this was awesome and easy to make and I know it'll be part of my rotation!

Anonymous, thanks for tipping me off about the site copying my recipe word-for-word. I have contacted them, but don't want to publish your comment because I don't want to send people to a site doing that soft of thing.

Thanks for joining the conversation! I love hearing from readers and even though I can't always reply to every comment, I will always answer specific questions on a recipe as soon as possible. Sometimes I'm answering by iPhone, so my replies may be short!

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